SEO starting to pay off... without any backlinks!
by Mark JefferyI've heard that getting backlinks from other websites with authority is the way to build SEO, but, well, I'm not very good at asking people to add links from their websites to mine.
I've also heard the opposite, that Google doesn't care so much about backlinks these days, they're so good at analyzing the quality of your content that that's all that matters these days.
So I set about creating some quality content on my website, a guide to the best globes money can buy: https://goodwoodglobes.com/guide/
And it seems to be working. A search on "globe buying guide" now has my website showing up #4 in the rankings. Since I'm selling globes, that makes me happy!
Here's how I did it... without any backlinks to speak of:
- content that's genuinely useful (why bother trying to trick Google's bots into thinking that the content is useful for humans when you could just make it genuinely useful?)
- content that's pretty (it has been a huge task to get permission to reproduce images from each of the globemakers I link to, but most of them are grateful for the links!)
- content that's generous (other globemakers' "globe guides" include only their own globes, whereas I'm happy to include the best globes in the world no matter who makes them)
- content that I love (I really like globes, and it has been a true pleasure connecting with other globemakers to put together my guide)
Do you have any SEO tips that go against the conventional wisdom?
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Good job! But keep in mind that Google does care about links. Even if that specific article hasn’t any, your website has 51 backlinks. This means that you have a sufficient domain authority to rank for a very limited number of low competition keywords.
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@markjeffery how many pageviews monthly now?
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Well, this is embarrassing, but I don't actually track page views. Here's why:
- I've spent a lot of time in my day job complying with GDPR and other proliferations of pointlessly specific privacy regulation, and it doesn't seem worth the effort; by not tracking, I know I'm in compliance;
- when I've tracked page views on my other web sites, it has made me happy when it goes up, but it has never changed what I've done, i.e. the information has never been actionable;
- ruthless prioritization of other things!
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@markjeffery we're working on GDPR compliant and privacy friendly visitors' tracking solution
DISCLOSURE: yes, this is my project. It isn't free but I have perks for fellow-indie hackers, — use this link to get $50 off second purchase-
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Good to know, thanks!
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Another option you could use is Google Search Console. It does not track the users beyond the country, device and search term. And that happens on Google's search page. No tracking happens on your website.
Through this you can get the search terms, number of people who saw, number of people who clicked, the position on the search page etc.
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Awesome, thank you, I will take a look!
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you can use simple analytics - it's gdpr compliant as they don't track
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Yes, I really like the Simple Analytics approach. Long term I'd like to replace Google Analytics with Simple Analytics or something similar on all my web sites. Thanks!
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Hi Mark,
Judging your SEO effort by looking at your ranking in Google can be misleading. Results in positions from 4 and below can change between hours, location, device etc.
I would rather look at the number of page views, sessions or unique users. These are stil vanity metrics of course. Eventually you need to look at conversions (whatever these mean in your businness).
Backlinks still play a big role in SEO and you cannot ignore them. If all parameters are equal, the higher domain authority will determine the winner of the battle of rankings in Google results.
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Yes, I agree about vanity metrics! I still have a production backlog right now, so I'm not taking any new orders, which would be the ultimate metric, so my most important metric for now is the number of people signing up to be notified when I'm able to take new orders.
And yes, I take your point, backlinks are still important! Thanks for the response!
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Well done on getting such a good ranking without much off-site SEO. I like that you're focused on content that appeals to humans and not bots. Some people get so lost on how they should try to trick bots that they forget actual humans are reading the content and judging you.
I wonder though, are you able to tell whether people are looking for the type of globes you make, or could they possibly be looking for buying guides on not light bulbs, for instance (sometimes referred to as "globes" in my part of the world)? Maybe that is what you're offering as well? In which case great :)
Where you can, you should try to monitor the actual keywords people used to land on your page to determine whether they were the right audience. Your bounce rate can also be a good indicator. You have some good CTA's on the page, so it should be quite low if you're offering the right product to the right audience.
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Yes, good points!
I'm not too concerned about whether what people are searching for is precisely what I'm offering: 99% of the globes in my guide are other people's globes, not my own, and if I'm able to connect someone with any globemaker, that's good by me.
I'm hoping Google will be clever enough not to direct searchers of light bulbs to my guide! One enormous problem with "globe" as a search term is that at a certain time of year people are searching for "globes" meaning "Golden Globes". Again, not much I can do other than hope that Google does a good job in teasing out the difference from the context!
One day, I will do as you suggest and dig more deeply into search terms. For now, I'm just happy to have gone from being unknown to being recognized by Google.
Thanks for the ideas!
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Have you heard of the Keyword Golden Ratio (KGR) method?
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No! Just looked it up. I have heard of various ways to decide which keywords to try to rank for. As my first stab at SEO content, though, I've just created what I think is relevant content, regardless of search volume. You can tell I'm an SEO amateur!
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Hey we all have to start somewhere! I highly recommend this playlist for Keyword golden ratio, It'll teach you everything you need to know about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NuPMusiq8s&list=PLTRfQ_cd-edFDM39ZcRd949txumo-bE1E
Then these youtube channels really helped me understand the basics of SEO:
Ahrefs - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWquNQV8Y0_defMKnGKrFOQ
Miles Beckler - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7RZRFCrN4XKoMsy5MgJKrg
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Congrats Mark. Backlinks may not have been necessary in this particular case because the keyword doesn't seem to have a lot of search volume. According to Google Ads Planner, this keyword sees 0-10 searches a month. Because it's not a high traffic keyword, the competition too doesn't seem to have invested in backlinks (or long-form content which is another critical factor these days).
In fact, there is such low volume of competition that this Indiehackers page is currently ranking #14 for this keyword.
But this does seem like a niche with not a lot of SEO heavy competitors overall. So if you can learn and implement the SEO-best practices, you are going to quickly outrank competitors.
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Ha, yes, it is low volume! Thanks for looking it up, and I'm glad Indie Hackers is up there in the rankings, too, after only a few hours!
This is a problem with globes: it's not something people search for very much. For example, if they're looking for a gift, they'll search for gifts, not globes!
My long-term strategy is to look into affiliates, i.e. getting people with high-traffic gift web sites to feature my globes and pay them a commission.
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Awesome results, but this is where not knowing SEO can be dangerous.
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Make sure you are not seeing your site because of personalization . Google still personalizes results. See if you rank for all the terms when you do incognito mode on your browser.
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Google rewards freshness still. Are the articles fairly new? It's not uncommon to see new articles rank high for a few days/weeks and then drop off.
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We just came off 2 recent Google algorithm updates in Jan 2020. While you are ranking now, it may not have been because of your efforts if your articles are old. Meaning, you did all of this work thinking you needed no backlinks, then the update happened, then you rank, now you correlate having no backlinks = rankings. It very well could be other results got pushed down from the algo updates and you moved up, but not for what you think or correlate with. What happens with the next update comes and pushes you down? If you moved up because of that, you moved up/ranked well not because you did something right, but because others did something wrong potentially and you just "stuck around" long enough.
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We've also had a lot of recent "un-named" updates to Google serps too the last 30 days ( feb and march ) as seen here: https://moz.com/mozcast/
Feb 28th, May 3rd and May 9th are pretty telling. You would want to check to see when your articles starting ranking to see if there is a correlation with those dates potentially.
Not trying to burst your bubble on your success, but make sure you really know why before you write off link building.
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Thanks for the SEO health warnings!
- Yes, I'm aware that Google results are personalized. I did the search in a private browser window, but even this doesn't hide your IP address, so the results can still be personalized to some extent, e.g. by location. I also did the search from startpage.com, which doesn't reflect Google results precisely, but is fully anonymized, i.e. it's from a different IP address, so it's a pretty good reflection of what the world is seeing.
- The articles getting on for a year old now, but I've been updating them and adding new globemakers regularly, which I hope helps quench Google's thirst for freshness!
- & 4. Yes, for sure, I'm no SEO expert, and I'm entirely unaware of algorithm updates! I wanted to explore the path of, rather than follow every twist of an ultimately unknowable algorithm, just create good content, without doing any link building, and see what happens.
And don't worry, you're not bursting my bubble: it's great to get the benefit of your greater expertise on SEO & link building. Thanks!
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Good list of advice. To support the #1 item on the list, this guide is the fifth result for me - just under "People also ask".
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This comment was deleted 6 years ago.
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Cool